Come Too Far
by Cassie Jamie
Summary: He thought perhaps, for the first time, he was truly seeing Casey Novak. Sequel to "See the Sunset".
1. Chapter One

"_History is a set of lies agreed upon_."

- Napoleon Bonaparte -

"_In 1961, Richard Abernethy, on vacation in Dublin with his family and a few close friends, raped and murdered Mary Carter. She was a companion on the trip and had lived two doors down from the Abernethy family since birth. She was Richard's best friend and confidant according to the neighborhood kids._

"_Because of the murder, the family sent the grandparents and children home early while the investigation was conducted. He returned to the local governmental offices were he worked as file clerk during the summer and when suspicion for her death turned to the travelers that October, Richard stole the identity of Peter McDuff, a local man who'd died of a heart attack earlier in the year._

"_He went on the run, getting to Canada and from there, England. Where he was headed is unknown, but evidence indicates he was trying to get to Russia. Only he never made it there – a marriage license was filed in Czechoslavakia in February of 1968. Peter John McDuff and Zora Novak. In November the following year, their first child, Dobrila, was born._

"_Before she was even a month old, everything changed."_

"_Being there at the moment is everything._"

- Anon -

**Monday, December 23**

Two days to Christmas and George Huang was staring at the file they'd mostly ignored during the search for Eliska. It was heavily censored, some of it in Czech, and most of it hardily worth keeping in a government sealed file in the first place.

But being an agent of the FBI, he knew there had to be more than met the eye. He reached behind the paper-clipped and mostly blacked out packet on Zora to withdraw pictures of the Novak children, photos taken from the hospital by the then-communist government.

Dobrila was a sweet looking baby, a tuft of dark hair on her head in stark contrast to the fair skin she'd had. Idly, George wondered if she'd remained pale as her younger sister as she aged.

"I'll never understand," Olivia commented. She'd come up behind him in his office, immediately seeing what he was so studiously hunched over. "There are so many beautiful children that are used and thrown away like garbage."

"We're not meant to understand." He sat up a little straighter and gestured toward the chair opposite him, waiting to continue until she'd settled. "I can give you psychological reasons and behavioral ones, but we both know that there's nothing that will justify what's happened."

She sighed, nodding her head in agreement. "I still wish we'd noticed. Casey was two months pregnant when she was fired. How could we not have seen that? She'd always been outspoken and she was constantly riding the line of being fired, but looking back now..."

"Looking back, you can see the signs and make sense of things that didn't before. But you can't let it consume you. You, Elliot, John, Fin – no one is guilty of purposely ignoring abuse," he told her. Huang knew that the unit had been blaming themselves, that they were putting in so much overtime as a way to atone for what they perceived as their fault.

"I'm trying, George." Benson picked up the picture of Casey – _Marochka_ – from the table and after flopping it back down, spoke again, "I can't imagine how alone she must have felt."

He took the picture from her, putting it beside the one of Eliska and said, "She may have felt alone but she had a reason to not give up."

That was something else Olivia couldn't imagine: Casey had sacrificed her teenage years to raise a child, leaving the only city she'd ever known in the only country she'd ever known with no money and no suitcase. She had taken Eliska and traveled through four nations, managing to get into England where she worked full-time off the books while she obtained a college degree and kept an apartment. She'd homeschooled Eliska on top of all that and done a damn good job of it.

"Did you find anything?" She asked finally, after a few moments of silence had passed.

"No. Unfortunately, my expertise is not going to help." He hated to admit it; he was an FBI agent as well as a psychologist, and his training should have offered some insight, but so much had been blacked out.

"We appreciate the effort," Olivia told him. "Translation Services is working on the pages for us. I'll let you know if there's anything in it of use." She started to gather the papers together, carefully hiding the photo of Casey, big eyes on a skinny baby, beneath the one of Eliska and then placing Dobrila and Milana on top.

She wouldn't say it aloud and George didn't need to ask to know that Olivia couldn't bring herself to look at the hopeful eyes of the newborns who had grown into the disenchanted Novak girls. She didn't know either of the elder siblings though. Their eyes didn't threaten to break her heart.

"When is McDuff being arraigned?"

"Tomorrow. Would have been today, but his lawyer pulled some footwork. Nicole is going to ask for him to be held until trial since he's a flight risk."

His expression turned serious and he said, "Don't allow Eliska in the court room. He won't need to speak to her to cause emotional distress and she needs to focus on healing from the damage he's already inflicted."

"I'll warn the court officers and ask for Munch to be called if she shows up." She hoped her face looked more assuring than she felt, uneasy at the thought of Eliska trying to see the man who'd actively tried to break and Casey's spirit and her own.

Walking back to the squad room minutes later, Olivia thought of Munch who had gone to Staten Island to pick Eliska up from her friend's home. His relationship with Eliska had started to take on a more fatherly tone though no one dared mention it, simply not wanting to point it out for the sake of the girl's emotional state. She had become so closed off that no one was sure of the boundaries or how she'd react to such comments.

She dropped the file on her desk, popping open the drawer and fishing through for an old photo that had once sat prominently on the desk.

They'd gone drinking, the detectives and their young ADA, at a local bar after one of their tougher cases. Over empty beer bottles and full mugs of coffee, Casey had shared jokes and Elliot had talked about his kids while Munch had remarked on a theory he had regarding cell phones. Novak's digital camera had made an appearance right before a round of complimentary shots hit the table and amid the ensuing foolishness brought on by lack of sleep, one decent picture of the group had been taken by their server.

When Casey was fired, Olivia had shoved it into the drawer, effectively ignoring it although she wasn't sure which of her emotions had fueled the behavior: anger, sadness, or bitterness. Either way, it had been a permanent resident until that moment.

Looking at it, she sighed. How different could things have been if she'd picked up a phone? Stopped by the apartment? Sent a letter? If she had reached out, Alexandr would still have existed but would the pregnancy have gone longer?

"Stop," Elliot called from across the desks. "I know that look."

Rather than comment, she set the photo in it's simple frame back with the rest near her computer and said, "TARU found the rest of Casey's medical records. Three different clinics in different parts of Manhattan. She saw an OB-GYN on 72nd for three months, one at NYU Downtown, and a sliding fee on 47th randomly over the course of a year and a half."

"Did she use a different name?"

"Her primary physician had her name as Casey Lynn Novak, the OB-GYN as Cashel McDuff, NYU as Casey M. McDuff, and the clinic as Marochka Novak." She handed over the legal pad she'd written out the information on.

"Well, she could have been trying..."

Eliska broke into the conversation, telling them, "She was trying to make sure no one could take Alexa from her once he was born. Father always swore that Alexa would be taken away if she said anything about what he did to her." She shrugged there and waited, sure that they would ask her what she'd been expecting since she saw the manila envelope from the embassy on Benson's desk.

But it didn't come, instead Cragen called the girl into his office and she quietly went, smiling when she saw the unit's ADA.

"_Good people do not need laws to_

_tell them how to act responsibly,_

_while bad people will_

_find a way around the laws._"

- Plato -

Nicole Leona Carthing was a woman of great intellect and equally warm personality when dealing with others. Of course, when it was needed, many times against perps and coworkers, she could weld words like weapons and make more scathing remarks than anyone would expect. She would not bend under the weight of her position, glad to find some small way to make someone's life better.

She, however, had never expected one of the lives she would touch would be Casey Novak, legendary ADA for SVU. No one's reputation had ever been so controversial in the DA's office in the history of the department; either Casey was considered honorable for her tireless efforts or she was seen as a zealot. The issue with Judge Taft often being cited for the latter despite the outcome.

They'd met in Law school, sharing a class and, due to financial straights, a textbook. She was one of the few who had met Eliska, a sweet little thing at eight years old. Even then the girl's disposition had been outgoing and outspoken, so much like her sister that Nicole had often wondered if they were mother and daughter instead of sisters.

Reading the file she'd been handed that fateful November day, she'd problems believing it really was Casey and Eliska she would represent in court after an arrest was made. It had only been after she'd seen the photos and talked to Olivia and Munch that she had allowed herself to truly accept it and within hours, she was summoned by McCoy to have a private sit down.

Now, six weeks later, she was sitting in her office with the overhead on and the shades pulled open, staring out the window at the people leaving for the night. Trenchcoats, overcoats, jackets with briefcases and metrocards at the ready, everyone was headed home to sleep and prepare for their appearances before a judge.

"Nicole?" Warner called from the door, not moving for a moment while the other woman faced her. "It was open."

"Always has been," Carthing responded. She walked over from the table and settled down in front of her desk, leaning onto the top and crossing her arms over her chest. "What's up?"

"My final report. I thought it might help you during trial." She handed over the covered file, sitting down in a chair and telling Nicole, "Alexandr's DNA test was exactly as expected – match to Casey and to McDuff. I also reviewed the autopsy reports from the Czech Republic for Dobrila and Zora. Dobrila's cause of death is listed as internal bleeding from an unknown cause, but that poor girl was beaten over the head repeatedly. Her skull was broken in multiple places and the forehead had actually impacted on her brain."

"And the mother?" She asked, staring at Melinda as she set the file on top of her other papers relating to the case.

"The nature and variety of her broken bones is more like someone being pushed down a flight of stairs and then kicked rather than someone who threw themselves down them. Her cause of death is considered suicide, but the photos in the file show boot imprints on her back and a bruise on her arm in the shape of a hand. It's assault in the very least."

The sigh came on involuntarily. "Well, that'll be three governments wanting to prosecute him then."

"Three?"

"Peter McDuff is also known as Richard Abernethy. He raped and murdered a woman in Dublin in '61. They've been looking for him for forty years over it. If your information reopens the case, we'll be facing an extradition order from the Czech government as well the Irish." She walked over the opposite chair and sat down, trying to decide what she should do.

For the murder in Ireland, he would, at some point, face sentencing though she wasn't familiar with his laws enough to know what the punishment would be in terms of years. The same for the Republic. In America, they could charge him with the death of Dobrila who, like her siblings, had dual citizenship and as such was protected in part by US Law.

At least his arraignment in the morning would proceed. The court wasn't going to stop his indictment though his trial would be delayed while the details of the law were worked out. She personally hoped that the extradition would be struck down, leaving the US to decide his fate. For incest, sexual assault, murder, and attempted murder, he wouldn't set foot near Casey or Eliska again in his lifetime.

They each brooded for a moment, digesting the reality and enormity of what was about to be undertaken. This was not going to be a simple case with so many lines to walk and red tape to navigate. Lord knew, they'd have to deal with officials from all levels of the judicial system.

Quietly, Melinda admitted, "It doesn't really matter where he gets locked up. It matters that Casey and Eliska don't have to think about him as a threat."

"No, it matters that they see him paying for the crimes that matter to them. And that may mean losing the US' right to prosecution, so he can be charged with the murder of their mother," she explained, recalling the things Eliska had told her in the sanctity of Cragen's office. Her voice had been confident as she admitted Casey often missed their mother, often mentioned how much she wished Zora had been there to see Eliska grow up.

McDuff had stolen the innocence of three children, raised his hand to the fourth, and taken away the one person who had ever tried to protect them. Casey would never put herself before that loss, Nicole knew, although things had changed. Who knew what she would say when she discovered what the sixty-four year old Peter had done to the teenager.

She was so lost in thought, she never heard the medical examiner leave, but when she fell back to reality the chair was long vacated.

Nicole returned to her desk and pulled out the McDuff/Novak file from the stacks. She could probably recite verbatim the facts recorded within, but she wanted to be prepared and it couldn't hurt to read it again.

It certainly had nothing to do with the need to see Peter McDuff suffer for what he'd done.

"_Whoever is in distress can call on me._

_I will come running wherever they are._"

- Princess Diana -

CSU released the apartment three days after Christmas, telling SVU that Eliska was free to return whenever she wanted but, "it'd be best to let clean up come through first. That area rug in the living room is trashed."

Yet, despite the warning, Eliska went back to the home as soon as she was able that afternoon.

The furniture had been left as it was when she'd last been there almost a month earlier – couch against a wall, coffee table flipped back. Her eyes jumped from paper to paper on the floor, immediately stooping down to collect them in case they were something important in them even as her logical side pointed out that such items had already been taken for evidence.

She carefully tapped the short edge against the kitchen counter as she walked in to the room, setting down the stack before taking stock of the area and noting that she'd have to clean out the refrigerator as well as go grocery shopping. Her sister's room needed a full on attack with the vacuum and laundry bags.

Only her room remained unscathed, bed made and clothing neat in drawers. Her most prized possession, a glitter globe with a dancer inside that Casey had bought her at the start of college for a considerable sum of money, sat sparkling in the bright sun.

It was like day and night, and without a word, Eliska handed John and Olivia a garbage bag and a hamper respectively.

For the two detectives, it was a lesson in trust as the girl left them alone in the living room while she tackled Casey's bedroom after telling them, "I know we'll probably move out once my sister is better. Rent is pretty high for what we can afford anyway, but I don't want her first thought when she walks in here to be about what happened. She still has to sleep at night."

She had shut the door behind her, another explicit display of trust – not keeping them in her sight and allowing them free run of her home – which gave both detectives the chance to converse though it was kept to hushed tones.

"I haven't been able to see Casey's son yet," Munch remarked after they'd grown quiet, his hand sitting on a date book. In pen, made bold by repeated writing of the same words over themselves, was an appointment for May: _Results of pregnancy test due_. "How's he doing?"

"The bronchitis meds have helped, but they still don't want to release him until he's stronger." She picked up a magazine CSU had left behind, opening it to a random page and noting the crib Casey had circled and then crossed out for a cheap playpen on the other side of the page.

"And how's she?" He asked without looking up, the date book pushed to the side and a sealed letter to Jack McCoy now in his sight. In all his time with Eliska, sitting with her at the hospital and talking with her about her sister, he'd never asked about her condition. It was hard enough knowing the Casey Novak who'd fought in court and faced down molesters, murderers, was the same Casey Novak who'd been living in hell for a year and a half, now laid out in a hospital.

He would admit to no one that he'd refused to listen to any information on her health – he didn't think he could handle it, not when his image of her had already been revised tenfold.

"Better, but she's not woken up yet. They're keeping her pretty heavily sedated," Benson said. "She doesn't have any severe neurological damage that they've seen on scans, but the doctor said the amount of pain she'd consciously be aware of awake, it was better to continue to let her body heal." She added, "They'll start bringing off the sedation in a few days," as she reached for some towels that had fallen from the linen closet in the fray.

She was standing in the kitchen when the next words slipped from Munch's lips, the hamper shoved into the bathroom across the hall. He was never one for being so serious unless absolutely necessary and it seemed it was one of those necessary times.

"Casey won't be the same," he stated.

"She doesn't have any brain damage, John..." She'd played dumb for a minute, a tactic she'd always used to pull more information from a suspect, but the look he gave her ended it. "Are the lives of any of our victims ever the same?"

He only shook his head and walked away.

"_Out of difficulties grow miracles_."

- Jean de la Bruyere -


	2. Chapter Two

"_Out of difficulties grow miracles_."

- Jean de la Bruyere -

"_You have one message. To listen to your..._"

Two buttons pressed in succession.

"_Message received 1 January 2009 at eight-nineteen AM._"

One button.

"_This is Doctor Elisabeth Tennant at NYU Downtown Medical Center. I'm trying to get in touch with Detective Munch or Detective Benson. Casey Novak woke up this morning around seven and is asking for her sister. If it is possible for her to brought to the hospital, she can see Miss Novak until the close of visiting hours tonight. Also, please be advised that due to the nature of her head injury she is confused with language and is currently speaking Czech to my nursing staff._

_If you have any questions, I can be reached through the hospital switchboard at extension 861._"

Headset into the cradle, the shuffle of coats, and the slam of a door.

"_Surprise is the greatest gift which life can grant us._"

- Boris Pasternak -

"I thought she didn't have any brain damage!" Olivia remarked before the elevator doors had opened completely, while looking directly at the doctor who had been standing nearby. She had been told, several times over, that Casey's brain had come away unscathed; the doctors had sworn she would be fine.

"She had a Grade III concussion which is what put her in the coma," Eliska muttered, repeating by rote what she had been told. "It's likely that any head injury she's got wasn't permanent and was masked by the concussion, but that's not why my sister's speaking Czech." She looked at their confused faces and added, "One of my friends spoke in Spanish after she got assaulted because she was so scared that she couldn't remember English."

"Very good, Miss Novak," Elisabeth Tennant nodded. She'd been standing at the nurse's station, listening to the girl talk. She'd been genuinely curious to find out if Eliska actually understood Casey's medical situation or not given how little time she'd spent at her sister's bedside – something the detectives were about to learn.

"Thank you." Eliska shifted the backpack on her shoulder and asked, "Can I see my sister now? Please?" She looked hopeful and nervous at the same time, like someone who was facing the edge of a cliff and didn't want to look down.

It confounded Munch who'd been watching the reactions of the staff. In NICU they'd been patronizing but they'd all reacted like she belonged there, yet here on Casey's floor, she was being looked at like a rarity. Which was why the minute she'd separated from them, he glanced at each of his colleagues and asked, "Is there a particular reason Eliska is being reacted to like a plague victim?"

Tennant set down her pen and leaning against the counter with her forearms, told them, "When Casey was brought down from ICU, most of us assumed she didn't have a family. No one saw Eliska for the first few days and then it was sporadic at best. I think a fair number of the nurses thought she didn't care."

"Eliska Novak has been beaten, kidnapped, raped, and is caring for her own nephew in this hospital. Interestingly enough she still has to eat and sleep too," Elliot shot back.

"Nephew? If there's another sibling – older – that would..."

"It's Casey's son." Fin felt his hackles raise. Granted he'd not spent as much time with the kid as the others, he still felt vaguely protective of her. Perhaps because she had no family, perhaps because she was the little sister of a woman he'd once considered a good friend, he wanted to make sure she wasn't abused further.

Her only response was, "Oh," then sighing as if to apologize but all four just walked away. They'd heard enough bullshit over the course of the case from governments, agents, witnesses, and on paper, they didn't need to hear more.

"Nerozumím," Casey was saying when the door was pushed open, "Otec... Vzal si najdu? Nebo Alexa?"

"Ne. No on nenašla mě. Myslím, že je pryč." Eliska's Czech accent was flawless, as though she'd never left the country's borders.

But it was Casey's execution of the language that was surprising them. It was concrete fact that the woman had spent the first eighteen years of her life in the country; she held dual citizenship due to the nature of her birth and she had to be fluent in Czech by logic. It was still strange though, after five years of never hearing so much as a slip or a lisp on a word.

Without understanding what the two were talking about, Olivia knocked on the frame surprised neither had heard the creak and slide of the door in the first place. Their conversation must have been important and she kicked herself a little.

Casey's attention shifted hesitantly from her sister to her former coworkers. "Olivia, Elliot," she waited until the door had been closed to acknowledge Fin and Munch. All smiled at her, unsure what to say and not really able to form words anyway.

"Řekni jim, ahoj pro mě." Casey had turned her eyes to Eliska once more and waited, reaching out to take the younger woman's hand and knowing something was wrong. Her sister would, like herself, never come straight out and say what that thing was, though, so she decided right then that it would have to be pulled out of Eliska.

God, how she'd hate herself later for it, although it would be a day or two before she'd have the strength to tease out the reason from her. Casey still felt sleepy, like she was covered in gauze and wrapped tightly, her blanket almost too warm as it lulled her to sleep.

"Can she understand English?"

Casey made a face at Olivia's question, perfectly valid as it was. "Ano."

"That's yes," Eliska translated, stepping up onto the hardbacked chair and sliding into the bed with Casey. It was a gesture that truly terrified the woman given the independent nature of her sister: Eliska hadn't tried to curl up with her like this since their first night in New York ten years earlier.

"How are you feeling?" John had moved from the edge of the group to the bedside, one hand resting on the bedrail, as he surveyed the last lingering impression of bruises on her face. Most had long since healed, but a few could be seen as a slight discoloration on pale skin.

As she spoke, just a few words at a time, Eliska continued to change Czech to English with eyes closed and her head against Casey's shoulder. She had started to yawn when the elder Novak raised a hand to stall any further questions and brushed a lock of long hair from Eliska's face, drawing it back behind her ear. There, half hidden by the lobe and some creative use of hair gel was a bite mark.

The bite mark.

"Ne," she murmured, pushing her sister's chin up and looking at her, "Eliska?"

"Mám se dobře."

Fine? Casey ran her tongue over her lips, heart that much more broken at the thought that _he _had gotten his hands on her sister. That she had suffered the same as she and was trying to be stoic. Eliska didn't know how many nights Casey had grieved for herself, letting it go for the sake of the child she was raising and the one she eventually would. With her eyes drooping from the exertion of simply being awake, she said, "Lhář," and kissed Eliska's forehead.

"_Is solace anywhere more comforting_

_than in the arms of a sister?_"

- Alice Walker -

Eliska never came out and said anything about Peter or her two days with him. Casey, too weak to argue for the first few days, let it be until she had regained enough strength to be released home with a pre-certification for physical therapy to get her sore legs used to walking again.

In between that time though, Casey used her friends to find out what had happened, first via extensive use of legal pads and then with words when her English gradually returned. Her status as guardian didn't mean she was privy to all the information and she didn't press for details that they weren't at liberty to discuss, but hearing the confirmation that their father had gotten his hands on Eliska while she'd been unconscious was a knife to the gut.

"Casey," John told her one afternoon following his shift while he sat beside her bed, "She wouldn't allow a kit."

Her head dropped back against her bed pillow. "Not surprised," she told him after a minute, though she didn't elaborate. "Has she been taken to her therapist?"

"We tried. She went for one session and refused any more. George is starting to get twitchy about it," Munch replied. He smiled when she did at the mention of Huang, who actually had been pushing hard for therapy to be instituted. It was that insistence that had gotten Eliska to reveal she did, in fact, have a psychologist, but there was no way to compel her to go.

"You don't know the trick," Casey said as she reached for the spoon on the lunch tray she'd been mostly ignoring. Despite begging, they had continued to bring her the food prescribed by the hospital nutritionist; they hadn't listened when she'd described her food allergies making for daily arguments with the staff. "I really need to get something delivered."

He popped open the jello for her and make a face at the limp meatloaf and grey peas. "I'll pay," he told her and questioned, "There's a trick?"

"Bribery. Mainly books she wants, but sometimes a pair of shoes or a bag or something. Gets her every time. Especially the books." She wrinkled her nose at the plate, reluctantly starting with the peas. "Eliska's... headstrong and since I've never gone to therapy, she thinks she shouldn't have to. She doesn't understand that I don't want her to know this kind of life."

"So she has spoken to her therapist about..."

"Yes, she has. And right after dad came back, it was reported." The spoon went down and she wiped her mouth with the napkin, before continuing, "I made it disappear."

"Casey."

"She was in school, John. She was rarely home and I always made sure if he wanted to hit someone, it was me. She got caught in the cross-fire a few times, trying to get him to leave me alone, but I never let him do to her what he did to me. I would have killed him myself," she told him with venom in her voice. Casey sounded like the woman he'd known, piss and vinegar, and it was the same tone she used when she tacked on, "I want to kill him."

"Trust me, you've got a line of people all wanting to do the same. Cragen would probably help hold the bastard down." He refused to point out that no matter what country he found himself held in, Peter McDuff faced being beaten and assaulted himself – it wasn't just America where child molesters were the lowest scum on the prison food chain.

"You know you still haven't made your statement. It's been a week and a half," he prodded gently.

"And I'll give one to you before ADA Carthing comes today." The jello was cherry, thank god, and she swished it through her teeth, knowing it annoyed Munch. He hated the noise it made though he'd always liked to joke about the faces she made while doing so.

"Trying to distract me with disgusting sounds won't work," he told her, trying to be stern and comforting at once but sure he was failing. "Talk to me, Casey. Tell me what happened."

She settled back once more, dropping the spoon onto the tray once more. "I can tell you in explicit detail what happened that night, John, but that's not what you want to know, is it?" His silence was sharper than any answer. "I worked in the one department where I heard all the terms, saw the counselors, and told victims every day that it wasn't their fault. Every time I walked into the squad room, I had the posters with the helpline number right in my face and pictures of people with bruises on their faces.

"I used to look at them whenever I was in there. And I thought 'how much of a hypocrite am I?' I could tell teenagers convicted of sexual assault that no one had the right to touch them, but I couldn't walk up to you or Olivia or Fin or Elliot or George and say it. It goes against every cell in my body."

"Because you were scared?"

"Because I didn't know what to say. I've never said the words in relation to myself. I can say it about others, about Eliska, but saying it makes it real," she explained, one hand resting in her hair. She scratched her hairline, saying, "And it's not real to me, not to Casey."

He thought back to something Huang had said to them months earlier now, about dissociation. Could Casey really have been able to compartmentalize what had happened to her? Could she really have made herself believe that it wasn't really her who was being abused? "Who's it real to, then?"

"Me, but the old me."

"Who's the old you, Casey?" He appealed. Unbeknown to Munch, George was barely a few inches from the door, leaning against the hard wall and listening for what he was confident she would say.

She stumbled at first, forming the word on her lips twice before she could finally say it, "Marochka."

Exactly what the psychologist had expected – a psychological defense mechanism, protecting Casey's mind. He breathed a sigh of relief; this could be dealt with. This was not a mental disorder or a refusal to speak as they'd experienced with Eliska. No, Casey needed someone to help her verbalize what Peter had done and to teach her good coping behavior, but she wasn't a lost cause.

"Tell George to stop psychoanalyzing me and to get his ass in here," she said next without opening eyes she'd closed against the name she had been forced to give voice to. Inviting him in, though, was the last thing Casey said before she fell asleep suddenly, leaving them wondering how she had known he'd been there in the first place.

"_This is not a letter_

_but my arms around you_

_for a brief moment_."

- Katherine Mansfield -

_18 November 1995_

_Dearest Milana,_

_I don't know if you'll get this. I have promises from a friend that you will so perhaps we'll get to speak before the year is out._

_Eliska is well. She's very proud of being four and a half and makes a point of saying her age to anyone who'll listen. Her playgroup adores her – even the older girls follow her around! I wish I had a picture to send you, but she doesn't sit still long enough for me to get anything worth sending. She's reading and writing and I think she's up to three languages now, though it might be four._

_As for me, I'm doing well. I've made friends, particularly one gentleman who thinks Eliska's a sweetheart. We're friends, I promise, but it's nice to have someone around who can cook her a meal and help her with her schoolwork. I guess generally help raise her._

_I wish I had more to write. My greatest concern is father getting ahold of this and finding us, so please forgive the sparing nature. I just needed you to know I love you._

_I miss you._

_Marek_

"_Without justice,_

_courage is weak_."

- Benjamin Franklin -


	3. Chapter Three

"_Without justice,_

_courage is weak_."

- Benjamin Franklin -

Three things happened on the 24th of January: Casey was released from the hospital, Alexandr was released within an hour of her, and Eliska learned that their father had been released on bail.

Day had begun to turn to night when the phone rang, Elliot telling her to lock the door and the fire escape window and saying an officer would be by to stay with them per Cragen's orders. She ended up successfully begging for the detectives instead; Stabler promised they'd be there within the hour, but in the mean time "_don't let anyone in the apartment, Eliska – not even the landlord. Make sure you tell Casey the same._"

The latter part of the instructions was neglected in favor of letting her sister continue sleeping, the baby resting on her stomach, on the couch. The television had lulled them both to sleep within an hour of their arrival home and Eliska wasn't going to wake them, not even because of Peter.

Instead, she fretted by herself, in the dark, and waited. She tried to ignore the terror it instilled in her to know that her father was loose on the streets, aware of where they lived and not knowing if he'd try to get to them. Would he try to leave the country and come back later? Would he leave and they'd never have to think of him again? She snorted at the last thought: they'd left and spent almost a decade and a half looking over their shoulders, paranoid he'd be there one day.

And the reality was, that was exactly what happened. Casey had gone to work one day, her mind on cases and grocery lists. It had been one of the few times that she hadn't actively had an eye out for the man who haunted her nightmares and daydreams, which was why she'd not noticed him follow her into the building. He'd followed her down the hallways to her office, and had stood outside the door while she'd hummed to herself and set down her briefcase. Eliska didn't need her sister to tell her the response that followed, it was guessed without hesitation.

She'd been spiraling since then, looking for solid ground and losing it every time she found some. Eliska had to leave college for summer, but eventually had to return to the safety of the dormitory; she'd lost SVU and her position with the DA, and she'd lost some of the closest friends she'd ever had. Her job at the grocery was long gone and the medical bills now totaled far more than Casey could hope to pay off on a retail salary. If she was even able to find another job in the industry.

A knock on the door. Hard and unrelenting. Just like Peter's the day he'd come and taken over their lives.

He'd come back... He wasn't going to let them be... He...

"Eliska? It's us, honey." It was Olivia's voice, not her father's. Not Peter.

She let out the breath she'd been holding, glancing at Casey and Alexa to ensure they were both asleep still, before moving to the door and checking the peephole to ensure it wasn't her mind playing tricks. She was too emotionally drained to deal with it at the moment; sure enough, however, it was Olivia with Munch in tow. She saw nothing of Elliot or Fin and that was all right with her.

Popping the lock, she pulled the door open and tried to smile, unable to do so. She waved them inside instead without looking up and shuffled into the living room to plop down on the floor in front of the coffee table where she'd set out a handful of US city brochures and multiple baby books.

"Planning a trip sounds like a good idea," Munch commented after he and Olivia had each sat in one of the plush chairs.

"Yeah, a trip." The mutter was filled with dry sarcasm and Eliska picked up one of the brochures for St. Louis. Behind her, Casey had begun to snore gently; Alexa snuffled as little eyes blinked open and he looked toward his young aunt. "Hey you, go back to sleep. It's not time to eat," she whispered, watching as eyelids closed as if on cue. She turned her attention back to the pamphlet in her hand after he'd quieted once more.

St. Louis... Baton Rouge... Tampa... So many choices to pick through, so many places they could live happily.

Olivia didn't need to ask precisely what Eliska was doing; she'd thought of it a few times in her darker, younger days. Sometimes, while her mother vomited for the third hour straight and the apartment stank of alcohol, the thought of running away, starting over, was the only thing that kept her from actually doing so.

There was an awkward silence for a few moments before Eliska finally said, "He's always able to get away. Marochka told me that a long time ago."

"Every criminal gets caught, Eliska. Every one." Munch leaned forward in the seat, eyes trained on the girl as she kept her gaze on the table.

"Not him." She shrugged, but her hands clenched around a brochure touting the virtues of Baltimore.

Quietly a hand snaked across the distance and set itself down on Eliska's head, fingers tousling through strands and Casey whispered, "Yes, him." She sounded convinced despite her tone faltering from her sudden rise to consciousness, though the elder Novak knew her sister wouldn't believe her. It had been her biggest fear in life, the fact that one day they would be found; it had been said over and over on her worst days, when she was so embroiled in the memories that she spoke in Czech and clung to her baby sister like a lifeline.

"Marek..."

"Casey," the woman corrected. This was what she'd done, Casey realized, she'd instilled in her sister the same fear of their father as some sort of being capable of eluding justice and punishment.

She winced, the worst of every scenario she'd ever thought of fulfilled: she'd fucked up raising Eliska. Without a word or a request for help, Casey lifted the sleeping Alexa from her stomach, moved him to the playpen nearby and then getting to her knees, she pulled her younger sister into her arms. She held on for a few minutes, silent, before saying, "I'm so sorry, sestřička." She kissed Eliska's forehead. "Can you give us a little privacy? Just for a bit?"

"Yeah. I'll put Alexa to bed, okay?"

"Sounds like a good idea," Casey answered. She waited until her sister had disappeared into the master bedroom to speak again, "She was supposed to move back into the dorm days ago. I'm not going to convince her to move back until he's in a six by six." Leaning back against the couch, Casey said, "I was seven. The first time. Just seven. When I told my teacher, she told Father and I got a beating for it. And every day thereafter."

"Casey..."

"Don't. It was my life, Olivia. I don't want to hear the same platitudes we give victims. I know them already," she admitted. Casey did know the usual volley of verbal comforts; she knew that she wasn't to blame for his abuse of her, and she knew that she had been helpless as a child to stop it. Those same statements brought her no ease these days when she was an adult, full grown and educated.

Sighing, she looked to Munch. "I...When he's convicted, and I know he will be, I want him extradited. I want him to sit in prison in the Republic. He hated Prague and he hated my family. Let him serve his time where he has to think about what he did to us."

She knew it wasn't possible – the trial was going forward and the United States had been given the right to prosecution of Peter McDuff. But, God, how Casey wanted it at that moment; to know that he would spend the rest of his life in a place he'd wanted nothing to do with.

Olivia simply rested her hand on her friend's wrist.

"_Fight to the last gasp_."

- William Shakespeare -

"_Dobrila was fifteen when she died. A child still, though she used to try to convince their mother that she would be fine with a three AM bedtime. She was a sweet thing, too – doted on her younger siblings like a little mother._

"_She'd come home from school that afternoon to find her father abusing her little sister. Marochka was eight, and already had dreams of being famous, living in America doing something glamorous. And that little girl and her twin brother were the only witnesses to seeing their sister get her head bashed in. Most likely she was the only witness to the cover up, but she's never said."_

"_She's talked about other events?"_

"_Not her."_

"_Other things may change us,_

_but we start and end with family."_

- Anthony Brandt -

It would have been Eliska's fourth semester at NYU had she not requested it off the following week. She and Casey hadn't fought over it nor had even discussed it. Eliska simply gone off with Munch the day after their father made his legal escape from imprisonment to the administrative office and requested the leave which was approved by the registrar right then and there.

Huang hadn't been surprised. "Her biggest concern right now is the safety of her sister and her nephew. She won't leave them until she's sure that Casey won't be harmed further." He was beginning to feel like something of a broken record given how many times he'd said just that sentiment to the squad.

Moving about his office, George sighed and sat back on the couch. He had read the translated documents for the sixth time in as many weeks, trying to create a profile of Peter McDuff now that he'd been given enough background on the man.

He was a compulsive liar, prone to delusions of grandeur, and possessive of people as though they were objects to be owned. He likely had killed more than the three they knew of; his marriage had been one of convenience, not love. His children simply playthings for his pleasure.

A finger ran down a white paper page, information on the whereabouts of one Milana Brawley McDuff meeting his gaze. This was a puzzle piece that didn't fit in his opinion: a twin abandoning their other half? What circumstances could have forced such an occurrence? Why had Eliska said the name on the home video taken from the apartment?

"That is a look I've seen before," Casey said, cutting into his thoughts.

She looked exhausted, her hair messy in its ponytail and longer than it was during better times. Her clothing, a simple ensemble of slightly too big jeans and a zip-up hoodie over a blue top, was neat, yet nothing close to her once impeccable fashion sense. Her flip flops were nearly worn out and he thought perhaps, for the first time, he was truly seeing Casey Novak.

"You going to invite me in or am I going to talk to you from the doorway?" She smiled at him with a hint of laughter in her tone. She seemed to waver on her feet then, one hand tightening on the doorframe until he waved her in.

Sitting down on the couch beside him, though at the other end, Casey relaxed into the leather and sighed at the documents spread out on the coffee table. "Profiling him?" She asked, her eyes on his hands as they neatened the piles.

"Does that bother you?" His voice had softened, took on a more submissive tone.

"No. So you can stop the concerned therapist act."

He gave her a small grin and said, "It's more a concerned friend than therapist," as he set the already-worn manila folder on the files. "How are you, Casey?" he asked, praying she'd give him a true answer and not some blatant brush-off.

He truly was worried for both the Novak women – one was actively ignoring her abuse and the other was using her son as a reason to avoid thinking about McDuff once again out in society. They both needed professional help, but getting them into a psychologist's office was going to require court orders and no one saw the benefits to that outweighing the damage it would cause. George's heart twisted to think that they were suffering for the sins of their father in silence.

"I'm okay," she shrugged. "Alexa's been keeping us awake at night. Don't think I've really slept in a week." Her eyes sparkled as she spoke of her son, but she shrugged as she admitted, "Eliska's been quiet."

"She needs to see her therapist."

"I know," she said, "I know. I'm trying, but she's putting up more fight than usual over it and I don't have the energy to deal with it right now." Casey leaned back on the couch, her head lolled back, and smiled gently at him as she smoothly changed topics. "I know you didn't have Elliot drive me over for chitchat."

"Would it upset you if I had?" He wondered aloud, curious where he stood with the woman. Her actions made it clear that she trusted the squad and others associated with them, but she was loath to call them friends.

"Not particularly, no," she admitted. "But I know that if you wanted to talk as friends, you would have called yourself instead of sending a detective with a message." Casey didn't have to mention how many times he had done exactly that – calling her cellphone and asking if she had time for a coffee, sitting down and talking over cases and tossing out jokes while they talked about their lives.

It was a subtle jab at him, a reminder that he'd abandoned her the same as the others. He could claim it was the workload he'd dealt with in the time she had been gone or that he'd been tied up in the start of a new relationship. The truth was that at first everyday he'd promised himself he would call and by the day's end, he had forgotten, and time went on until Casey became a passing thought in his mind.

Unsettling as it was that he'd been able to push a confidante from his life without any realization, he had to focus on the here and now.

He nodded to let her know she had been heard and George weighed how to continue. In the past, he would have been blunt, telling her outright anything he had to say; that was the way he'd always reacted to Casey Novak. Would she still appreciate that? Did the woman before him need a bit more compassion than he remembered?

"I actually wanted to talk to you about your brother," he told her in the end, softly but still firm. Casey may have been trying to distract them all from what she was dealing with – it didn't mean she was radically different from the woman who'd fought cases against rapists and murderers.

There was an obvious and visible change in Casey at the mention of brother Novak. Her eyes turned dark, guarded. Both arms went up across her chest and her splayed out posture turned to one ready to flee.

Huang was treading dangerous ground and he knew it.

"There's no record of him in the Czech Republic after August of 1991. The school attendance log says he was there on the nineteenth and not on the twentieth, but you didn't leave the Republic until July of 1993."

"I don't follow."

"There's two years between you and he leaving and that's a curiosity for me because twins are, generally, quite loyal to each other." He leaned forward a bit and told her, "And on the home video that was taken from your apartment, Eliska said his name."

"He left home and school in '91. He didn't leave me." It was muttered, but audible. "We only split up when I left home the night máma died, because he couldn't come with me. The group that helped me survive in Germany was women only – Milana couldn't come."

"What group?"

Casey sighed, rearranging herself though she came across no less defensive with her posture. It was time to get comfortable because it was going to be a long day.


	4. Chapter Four

"_Bravery is the capacity to preform_

_properly even when scared half to death."_

- Omar Bradley -

The squad was stationed at various points through the room as per usual: Olivia sitting at her desk, Elliot perched on his and Fin standing in the aisle. Munch was grabbing coffee while Cragen looked on from the side of the dry erase board and computer screens.

"The group only uses a code name for the woman who takes in the victim - Subvenio. It's Latin for _to come to the aid_ and they're a known underground group for abused and abandoned women and children. There is no known contact to get in to the organization to protect those being served by the group, but it seems, from what Casey said, to be similar to the group that helped Kim Hoffman."

Elliot recalled that case easily, the way he'd had to dive in headfirst to find Kim and going person to person. He'd thought back on that from time to time and realized not too long ago that someone would have to be truly desperate to do what she had. He had a hard time seeing Casey being that far gone, though it was easier to picture now than at the beginning of all this.

"They helped her get from Germany to the Netherlands and from there to Belgium and France. After that, she and Eliska were on their own."

"If they were on their own, how did he turn up in London?" Olivia asked from her chair, curious how Milana fit in all this and why George was so fixated on it.

"He was asked to come." Looking at the assembled faces, Huang explained, "In November of 1995, she sent a letter to a friend who had a contact to reach Milana. She didn't say how he contacted her, but Casey sent a second letter in February and he arrived in April."

"Why?" Elliot asked, his face scrunched a little as he tried to work out why Casey, so fearful of her father, would ever have chanced being found by contacting her brother. She'd put on the line being found in London, letting Eliska be found by the man.

George shook his head. "She wouldn't say anything specific, only that she needed him." He'd pushed her to find out what she'd needed him for, if there was something going on in her life then that called for the protection of family or if Peter _had_ found the girls back then and getting away again meant calling in Milana. But the latter didn't seem right given the fact that Casey had sent two letters four mouths apart.

The only idea he had left to explain it was spoken by Olivia, who told the others, "Maybe she just needed her brother."

"She was risking a hell of a lot by telling him where she was though," Cragen pointed out. "If he was in league with their father..."

"There's no way McDuff would have passed up the chance to get at the girls back then." Fin's chair creaked under his weight as he sat down, saying, "Casey swears he never wanted them but he's obsessed with those girls. He's been looking for them since they got away from him."

Novak cleared her throat as she came to a stop near them and with an amused smirk commented, "All I hear you guys talking about lately is me. I think I like being popular." She grinned at them before shifting her weight from one foot to the other and then sliding into the seat the Captain pushed over. "So what's new and exciting in my life that I don't know about yet?"

Olivia smirked and looked down at the papers on her desk. Slowly but surely she was figuring out that Casey's former demeanor came out when she was comfortable with her surroundings; Casey was trying to trust them, and she was getting used to their very presence in places they'd never been before such as her home. It was calming to know that she was still the woman they'd known.

"Can I ask you something?" Munch's calm voice came in the lull, waiting until she nodded before asking, "How did he find you? Eliska told us what she knew, but I guess we need to hear it from you, Casey."

"Of course she did," Casey sighed. She moved in the chair, unable to get comfortable and got to her feet, walking restlessly for a moment then putting herself up aside the marker board. She closed her eyes as she spoke.

"You have no idea how exhausting it is to spend your life looking over your shoulder, thinking one day that the monster you see in your sleep will be there. Eliska didn't get to stand on a balcony until last year because I was always afraid that he'd be waiting for her or he'd be down on the street, looking at us."

Huang, going from friend to professional in seconds, asked, "It has to be terrible to have to be alert every minute of the day."

She turned to face him and lifted an eyebrow to let the man know that she was too well-versed in his demeanor to not notice his change in mannerism. Still, she answered him quickly and went on from there.

"I'm used to sleep deprivation. Between father and my school work as a kid, I think Mila and I slept four or five hours if we were lucky and when it was just me and Eliska, there were times we'd both be up for days. Then undergrad, working, law school..." She let out a little laugh. "But every once in a while, I got too tired to be aware. Or maybe I just got complacent. I don't really know.

"Safest place I ever worked was the District Attorney's office. I let my guard down so easily there. Metal detectors, security personnel – who would dare try to get in to a government building with officers armed three feet away? I guess I forgot for a minute how good Father had always been about sneaking into places."

"He did a little B & E while you were growing up?"

Casey tossed a look at Fin. She spared a thought for how worried he had to be for his voice to be so deadly calm. "We were poor. Mama worked odd jobs for friends since Father couldn't hold down one of his own after he left the service. I only went to a good academy because I was granted a scholarship.," she explained, "And as I got older, I had to bail him out a few times after he tested the locks at the pub or got busted for stealing from the neighbors."

"You had to bail him out?"

"Mama was usually working late, Dobrila died when I was a kid, and Mila avoided having contact with Father as much as possible. I was the only one left and it was a hell of an experience the first time I had to go to the jail." She brushed a hair from her eyes. "I was actually thinking about that when he found me. I didn't notice him following me until after I'd gotten to my office and went to close the door. And there he was.

"I couldn't move and my heart was racing and then he shut the door, and I... I snapped. I remember thinking that I should be stronger, then there's nothing. Like television static until later that day when Elliot was asking me about the Hanson case." The mirthlessness in the tone of her voice was hard to miss when she muttered, "He stole my childhood, my mother, my sister, and the right to feel safe in my own home. Now he's stealing my memories too."

There was a moment of silence from Casey, echoed by the others as they digested what Eliska didn't tell them and probably didn't know herself. George finally broke it, gently pushing, "Casey, did he..."

"Don't say it," she cut him off, "Don't."

Olivia reached out for Casey's hand, stopping halfway between them and letting Casey decide. Her heart leapt when long fingers wound into hers, a small comfort taken by both of them.

"_Now those memories come back to haunt me_

_They haunt me like a curse."_

- Bruce Springsteen -

"_Eliska was just a child when they left – barely two years old. Casey carried her across the border between the Czech Republic and Germany so tightly Eliska actually remembers it because it hurt but she was too scared to move. Two years old and she was already terrified."_

"_So she wasn't abused?"_

"_That, sir, is a relative term. Eliska was never touched sexually, no, but she was subjected to the same behavior Casey was before the abuse began. She was shown pornography and Casey mentioned a handful of times that it wasn't unusual for Peter to expose himself to the children._

"_What she can remember, however, isn't that. She remembers hearing Casey crying in the night, back then and after they left, and she can describe in perfect detail how her mother looked on the floor the night she died. She may not have suffered his hand, but Eliska Novak is a victim as much as her siblings. She simply doesn't realize it."_

"_Darkness is only driven out with light,_

_not more darkness_."

- Martin Luther King, Jr. -

Eliska's birthday was fast approaching. Born in the early hours of April 1st, she always enjoyed the jokes and teasing that came from her birth date.

This year, not so much.

This year April first fell on a Wednesday, which in of itself wasn't a problem. The problem was that her eighteenth birthday would be spent in a courtroom, on the stand, for an entirely too long trial (in her opinion) on her father's crimes.

He'd been charged not only with the crimes against them, but both Ireland and the Czech Republic allowed them to try him on the murders of Mary Carter and Dobrila. Their mother remained unavenged though there had been promises made that should he ever be released from an American prison, he would be captured on a warrant and extradited for it.

She doubted highly, though, that he ever would see the light of freedom – he was sixty-four years old and had not led the most healthy of lives. He most likely would spend whatever time he had left in a six by six cell and truthfully, Eliska believed they'd both accepted it; at least for the first time in her life, Casey could live without the constant looking over her shoulder.

She was still standing in front of her closet thinking about it all when Munch knocked on her bedroom door. "Come in," she called.

The door popped open then, revealing the as-usual black clad man who smiled gently at her. "Ready to go yet?"

"Well, unless the judge wouldn't mind me sitting in pajamas in her courtroom, I'll say no." She laughed as she gestured to the gray lounge pants and baggy blue shirt. "I'm just trying to decide between a skirt or pants." The aforementioned articles were hung on one each of the French doors with the accompanying garments needed to make them an outfit.

John silently noted the two laden hangers. It was too early for shirt sleeved shirts, but they both sported thick sweaters and for the skirt, a pair of cable-knit leggings. No matter what Eliska chose she would be covering up every inch of skin she could. He moved forward without a word and pulled open the closet doors, revealing a plethora of tops and bottoms.

"I don't think I've ever seen a girl with more clothing." He mused, and asked her, "How about that dress?" The item in question was a long purple dress, a slight ruffle along the cross in the front. It had a higher-than-most neckline that would reveal only her collarbones – proper for an appearance in court.

"It's short sleeved."

Her reply was clearly meant as a rejection; he pointed to the long sleeved sweater beside it anyway. "I may not be winning any fashion awards, but that looks like it'll match."

Eliska sighed and grabbed the dress reluctantly. She tossed it down on the bed, casting a glance at it before looking at Munch with an expectant look. He didn't leave, though, and she muttered, "I don't want him to see me."

"Do you want to stay home?"

She snorted. "No way in hell," she said with vehemence, "I want to see him, but I don't want him to _see _me. He... he saw of me than I ever wanted to show." Her voice had grown softer with each word, her discomfort obvious.

Reaching for the left hanger, the one set out with pants and a heavy pull over sweater, he passed it over. He waited a moment while she picked apart the pieces of clothing she'd picked out the night before, then turned and walked out of the room to check on Casey. She too had been torn between outfits, but her choices were significantly narrowed due to her smaller wardrobe. Munch sighed at the thought; Casey had once had suits and outfits full of color and energy, but her father had even taken that from her. He'd thrown away, torn, and burned most of her clothing, forcing her into baggy shirts, jeans, and stained pajamas.

"There was a time I could have walked into a courtroom and not thought twice about what the judge thought of what I was wearing," she announced without looking up from the socks she was yanking on. "We're going to look like the odd couple, Eliska and I." Casey's hands fell on to her knees with a thud and she gave a short smile, before turning her attention to the baby sleeping quietly in the middle of the bed surrounded by what seemed like every pillow in the apartment.

Alexandr, the squad had learned, was suffering from colic and seizures. He slept little, keeping both girls on a schedule of waking every three hours to feed, change, or comfort the infant. John couldn't imagine living how they were and yet, he knew Casey and Eliska wouldn't change it for the world.

"No, we're a motley crew, that's what we are," she laughed after a minute, telling him, "I look like a grad student again with my baby who can barely hold his head up, while Eliska will no doubt look like dressed-down royalty."

"You look fine." He held back the urge to comment that perhaps seeing Casey with her nearly-worn-out clothing and stitches in the wound that stubbornly refused to heal, the judge would get a true taste for what she'd endured.

The look she gave him was perfectly Casey: a cross between sarcastic and amused with a little apathy thrown in. "I look tired," she said. "I feel tired. And it's not even begun – Father's attorney isn't exactly known for being kind to people. Even if his client's crimes are obvious."

"Well, he'll be sentenced for some of the charges," he pointed out. Alexa's existence and the DNA test preformed a month earlier had proved that, in the very least, he would be found guilty of incest, which would carry a few years imprisonment.

"Fathering Alexandr and kidnapping... I wanted him for murder, John." She stood up, pulling the too large cardigan tighter and then turned to her son, lifting him in her arms as he slept. "Guess I'll have to settle for knowing that he'll have to look me in the eye while he lies for the first time in my life."

"What if they eventually do find him guilty? If he's convicted?"

"I don't know, truthfully." She'd spoke with a look of thoughtfulness across her face, as though she'd never thought of such a possibility. Casey may have been angry at the man for what he'd done, wanted him convicted, but she still didn't believe it would happen.

Munch wondered why; wondered if years of seeing him elude justice in several countries, on more than one continent, had left her with a bitter taste in her mouth over the government's ability to charge and confine McDuff.

He was thinking over words, trying to decide the best way to go on when Eliska knocked on the door and entered. With her in the room, he realized the time and reluctantly, he guided them out to the car, unsure of what would happen when they arrived at the courthouse.

"_We dance in a ring and supposed,_

_while the secret sits in the middle and knows_."

- Robert Frost -

"_I was seven the first time. He... walked into my room and I just cried and cried and cried because it hurt, but he kept saying I was a good girl."_

"_Did you tell someone?"_

"_Only anyone who'd listen. Until he found out and then it was never worth mentioning again."_

"_The irony of life is that hardly_

_anyone gets out of it alive_."

- Robert A. Heinlein -

The diner was nearly empty.

Sitting around the table, the detectives were smiling and Cragen had lifted his glass to Casey as she leaned back into her chair with Alexandr sleeping in Olivia's arms. Eliska had gone to the ladies, but for the first time in a long time, Casey didn't feel the urge to watch the restroom's door or follow her in.

Although Peter (_Richard_, she reminded herself) had yet to be sentenced – he had a few days before that verdict was handed down – and she didn't plan to attend the judge's decision, the man had been found guilty on several counts from aggravated sexual assault to kidnapping to murder and fraud. He would remain in custody at Riker's until he was transported to which ever prison he would serve his time in, isolated from the general population, and that meant supervision and that meant no more having to look over her shoulder.

It would likely take both Novak women some time to actually accept such an idea and to let their paranoia rest, but already the others could see a faint easing of the tension in Casey who had always seemed to hold herself taut.

Eliska had been gone only a minute, everyone settling into their evening, when Olivia's eyes took on a thoughtful quality.

"I know that look," Elliot declared, teasingly before sipping at his drink.

She glanced down at the baby snoozing away in her grasp, then turned her attention to Casey, asking, "That first case you worked with us, I found you crying in your office..."

"It wasn't as much of a reminder as you might think, Liv," she cut off the other woman, going on, "It was that I could do nothing to stop it from happening again by nailing his ass to the wall. That and I was still very unsure of you lot. I wasn't expecting instant acceptance after how close you all were with Alex, but I wasn't prepared for rejection."

"We weren't rejecting you."

Stabler's immediate objection brought a fond look from the former attorney. "I know that now," she said. "I know that you were just upset when I threw myself into crime scenes and pushed witnesses, but I guess I was expecting the people Alex used to talk about. _Her _friends."

Eliska returned then, plopping down into her chair and yawning. She jumped when Cragen's cell phone began to ring, nearly dropping her drink in the process to the quiet laughter of the others. She smirked into the glass as she took a slug of the water.

"Thank you," Cragen said to the caller, adding, "No, that won't be necessary – they're with me." Taking the phone away from his ear, he slowly snapped the cell closed and announced, "There was a mix up at Rikers. Richard Abernethy was placed in gen pop instead of isolation. He was beaten to death half an hour ago."

The look of contentment on Casey's face fell, replaced by apprehension and, Olivia was sure, devastation. The United States had passed down justice by finding him guilty, while the inmates of the City of New York had passed down a death sentence in the form of murder. A murder that meant someone else would be tried and sent to prison while the man who had raped and killed his children would be seen as a victim.

"Excuse me," Novak muttered, "I need some air. Eliska, stay here, okay?" Her chair scraped the floor as she moved, glancing for a second at her son before moving toward the door.

It came open with less force than she'd thought she had thought she would need, only to find a person on the other side. A man with chestnut hair and blue eyes, who stood only a few inches taller than Casey herself but who's features were undeniably familiar.

"Marek," he said, stopping to correct himself, "I'm sorry. Casey now."

The table occupants rose, prepared to step in until he spoke again and Casey's shock became understandable.

"My brave, beautiful sister."

Propelled into the safety of his arms, Casey felt the tears on her face. Felt the constriction in her chest from holding back and she finally grieved.

"_Life is what we make it._

_Always has been., always will be."_

- Grandma Moses -


	5. Epilogue: Life Persists

The last time Casey Novak had seen her twin brother, their younger sister had just finished learning French.

Young Eliska with her soft, curly hair in a bow on her head and a long swirly skirt he'd bought her, had stood at the end of the terminal and waved until he'd gone from sight. She'd called out goodbye in all six languages she knew, her little voice ringing down the corridor and amusing other flyers who had smiled to themselves over it.

Casey, herself, had stood with both hands on five year old Eliska's shoulders, her mouth stubbornly shut and her eyes trained on the only person who could ever understand what it was like to grow up as she had. Her heart had been heavy in her chest, broken as it already was.

Neither one of them had ever expected to see the other again, so their real goodbye had been done the night before over home videos and top-shelf liquor. They had no need to say the words again after they woke on that day.

So they'd parted in silence with the bitterness of what life had dealt them and the faintest, unspeakable hope in their hearts that they were wrong, that they would see each other again.

And for the first time in their lives, fate had let hope win.

"How?" Casey muttered into Milana's neck, not willing to let go of him out of the fear that if she did, he wouldn't really be there.

"It made the news," he whispered, terrified himself that speaking too loudly might break an illusion, "My contact in Praha sent a paper to me as soon as he could, but you know how the groups work. I am sorry I was not here when you needed me."

She gave a pitiful little laugh, breathy. "Needed you right now and you're here," she said before reluctantly pulling away and staring at the man he'd become over the interceding years. His hair was a little shorter, his eyes a little sadder, and his clothes a little more expensive. There was a ring on his finger that gleamed on the light of the bar.

"Her name is Geneva," he said when she looked at him. "She is one of the most amazing women I have ever known and she's at the hotel with the children if you want to meet her."

"The children? You, who hated any kid under the age of three, have children?" She grinned, still holding the sleeves of his jacket tightly.

"To be fair, I hated only the ones we weren't related to," he answered, and glanced at Eliska, a soft expression on his face. "Let's sit and I'll tell you anything you want to know," Milana told her, as he navigated them both through the empty tables and upturned chairs to the only occupied one left.

She held his hand as tightly as she could, walking a step behind him and feeling the ache in her heart begin to ease. The realization came to her before they could sit; she felt her knees go weak before she hit the floor and her mind flooded with the thought that though she'd wanted (badly) for her father to suffer imprisonment, to suffer a complete lack of freedom in retribution for his crimes, his death meant they were safe.

They faced no threat of him escaping, little as it was, nor having to live in terror if he'd ever gotten parole, as little a prospect that had been too. Her mind hadn't let go of the ideas though, the possibilities and ways he could hurt them either inside or outside the prison walls, yet suddenly her brain wrapped around the reality that he was _dead_.

Gone.

"Casey," Eliska said, worriedly, as she touched her sister's shoulder.

"I can breathe," she murmured in reply. Her eyes turned to Milana's and with a sigh of relief, her lips curved in a smile, she told no one in particular, "I can breathe now."

Milana nodded in agreement, rooted to the spot and smiled back – he understood her words far more than any other in the room at that moment and he joined her on the floor. Kissing her hair, he spoke, "They'd be proud of us. So proud."


End file.
